Quote:
Originally Posted by Geese1
I'll be 46 by the time my car arrives. Married, no kids, but this is also going to be my daily driver so not like it's a weekend toy. Don't think I'm the primary market for this car, but other than the obvious, I'm not sure what other markets Toyota and Subaru were aiming for, so maybe I do fall right in with their plans?  |
In the old articles Toyota/Subaru state several times that the FRS was targeted at the young, up and coming professional and student demographics. The BRZ was aimed at the older crowd up to and including the retired or semi retired group that had disposable income and and interest in a sport and fun yet still usable car. The thought that these cars were all meant for teenagers and collage students is way off base. Just watch all the commercials and see what you think the average age is (Mid to late 30s by my guess). I don't think things went the way they expected and more younger guys went for the BRZ with the older crowd gravitating to the FRS/86.
This forum can sort of be used as a gauge as to measure the demographics even if it is a bit skewed since it means the members also like forums and are a bit more of the "enthusiast" crowd than many owners.
I have watched the demographics since I joined since it is something that interests me and have come to a few conclusions.
First off is the ages. May (possibly most) of the regular posters here are well north of 35. A good segment of them are that sub group are 50 or more. There is a significant number that are older than dirt! At almost 60 I am not even near the top of the age ladder here. This really isn't a weird as it seems when you start hearing about the cars that the old timers had in the past.
The other thing that really stands out is the number of serving or retired military personnel that seem to own these cars. It is an abnormally high percentage for such a niche product. I think that part of that is that this car (as most sports cars) draws a Type A personalty to it. This is exactly the same type of person that usually goes into military service (or if they didn't go in that way they were when they came back out).
The third thing I have noticed due to the various "what is your job" threads is not even remotely surprising since it was exactly who they were marketing to in the first place. The vast majority of the people here are either IT, engineering, medical, tech trades or studying to be one of those things. There are exceptions for sure but the bulk of us fit into one of those slots no matter what age we are. Toyota/Subaru called that one right on the nose!
Now, as the car ages we are seeing a change in those demographics but again it is exactly what you would expect. As they get less expensive the ages will drop. That is the rule with any car though.
The following data is fairly old but still stands the test in my mind.
Looking at the vehicles that were cross shopped or traded in you can certainly see that most of the buyers were not 20 years old. some of those cars are almost exclusive to the older crowd. The Tc seems to be a young persons car but since they were traded in you could consider that the owner bought it young and had it a few years so were probably well into their 30s.
This demonstrates how the forum skews things. We certainly do not have 18 to 24% females on here. Maybe 2% at the best of times (I know there are more than one here that people do not realize are actual women). The few women that do show up don't usually post much or stay long because we are a bunch of dogs half the time. The real clincher here is the average ages of who registered the cars. Maybe some were registering for their kids but the percentages are so overwhelming for the 35 plug age groups it makes no difference. What it does show is that the common thought that most owners are young dudes really does not work in the real world. There are a large number of these cars being owned and driven by women 45 year old and up!
Soooo... when somebody says "all the cars in my area are young guys who's parents bought it for them" I call bull shit. All you see is young guys simply because that is the crowd you hang with or the area that you frequent. For every single heavy modded, hard parking showpiece or track prepped race car there are 10 or more basically stock cars being driven to work everyday by men and women 45 to 1,000 years old (like Hum).